Last year at Book Expo America, Expert Swagger Suzie Townsend showed me the ropes. One of the MAIN EVENTS on Suzie's precision-and-efficiency-oriented schedule was Lauren Oliver's signing table. We waited in line for a. long. time. With the 18,000 lbs of books.

Lauren took a minute with each reader, chatted, and Harper was giving BOTH of her books away. OMG. I'd read BEFORE I FALL, and DELIRIUM looked just as good. I snatched greedily and skipped off to continue to pillage and burn.

Last week, I read DELIRIUM:

Before scientists found the cure, people thought love was a good thing. They didn't understand that once love--the deleria--blooms in your blood, there is no escaping its hold.

Things are different now. Scientists are able to eradicate love, and the government demands that all citizens receive the cure upon turning eighteen. Lena Haloway has always looked forward to the day when she'll be cured. A life without love is a life without pain: safe, measured, predictable, and happy.

But with ninety-five days left until her treatment, Lena does the unthinkable: She falls in love.

OK, I'll wait for the chills to subside...Lauren impressed me in BEFORE I FALL by cleverly examining a very complex subject: guilt and regret. She's done it again with DELIRIUM. Lena is a typical teenager, a little jealous of her gorgeous best friend Hana, nervous about her upcoming examination, which precedes the Procedure that will render her incapable of love. She's got some baggage. A familial history of deleria that has her hyper-analyzing herself for signs of disease. Her insecurities make her so real, and her history is haunting. The choices she has to face are unthinkable. And the end of this book put me in the fetal position (perhaps the most masterful use of repetition of a line I've ever seen). Go! Get it!

About Post Author

Suzie Townsend is a literary agent with New Leaf Literary. She represents all brands of children's and adult fiction and loves strong characters and voice driven stories that break out of the typical tropes of their genres.

I did, I did, I did go and get it! I walked by and went, "Oh! This is that book, the one in that blog!" I gave it a first page test. Delight! And then I bought it. And then I noticed the jacket-cover combo and went "ooh."